J-D track sides sweep to Freedom meet titles

Building on its regular-season success, Jamesville-DeWitt’s track and field teams both easily claimed the top spots in Thursday’s OHSL Freedom division championship meet at Fulton.

The girls meet saw the Red Rams pick up 196 points, well clear of the hosts from Fulton (80 points), while East Syracuse-Minoa slid into third place with 76 points.

Taylor-Rae Danforth won the 100 hurdles in 17.50 seconds, with Amanda Lee fourth, and Liz Pieri won the 400-meter dash in 1:00.70. The Red Rams’ 4×400 relay team of Liz Pieri, Katy Pieri, Ally Fox and Danielle Doss won in 4:13.24. In the pole vault, Doss prevailed by clearing 9 feet, the Spartans’ Megan Terry (8’6) settling into third place.

On her own, Fox prevailed in the 200-meter dash in 26.59 seconds, with Liz Pieri (27.90 seconds) in fourth. Fox nearly won the 100-meter dash, finishing in 12.92 seconds to Fowler’s Nytashia Survia (12.91 seconds), but did help Danforth, Liz Pieri and Katy Pieri (who was fourth in the 400) win the 4×100 relay in 51.87 seconds.

Rachel Fairbanks, in 5:11.82, claimed the 1,500-meter run, ahead of Laura Wengert in third (5:24.68) and the Spartans’ Brittany Kubecka (5:29.66) in fourth. Then, in the 800-meter run, Fairbanks won in 2:28.10, while ESM’s Juliette Miller (2:29.77) took third.

Hannah Stefl claimed a victory in the 2,000-meter steeplechase in 7:54.17, where ESM’s Grace Maring (8:25.38) was fourth. Stefl joined Fairbanks, Laura Wengert and Katie Pinkes as J-D cruised to the title in the 4×800 relay in 10:14.97.

Maggie Fuller went to the pentathlon and finished second, with 2,533 points, while teammate Noelle Novakowski was third with 1,953 points. ESM’s Heather Hiltbrand was fifth.

Allison Semmel got third in the 400 hurdles in 1:17.85, with Bridget Benz and Amber Tolhurst fourth and sixth, respectively, on the ESM side.

The Sparatns did find winners in, among other things, field events, where Amanda Wall took the long jump by going exactly 17 feet and flew 34 feet 11 ¼ inches to win the triple jump. Both times, J-D’s Patrece Martin finished second.

Nina Zesky, clearing 5’1” with fewer misses than Fulton’s Anna McKay, prevailed in the high jump, while in the 3,000-meter run Gabby Pallotta prevailed in 11:13.03 and Wengert (12:31.62) was third.

On the boys side at the Freedom meet, J-D had 180 points, nearly double the total of runner-up Mexico, who had 91 points. ESM also was third here, finishing with 71 points.

Will Sterriker led the way, as he tore to first place in the 110 high hurdles in 15.91 seconds and added a victory in the 400 hurdles in 58.16 seconds, the only time under a minute. Taumeras Howard (11.63 seconds) and Navale Taylor (11.68 seconds) went 1-2 in the 100 sprint.

Sterriker, Taylor, Howard and Marquis Drummond won the 4×100 in 45.51 seconds, where ESM, with the quartet of Jeff McDuffie, Mark Castro, Jayme Patrick and Tom Grayer, finished second in 46.28 seconds. J-D got to second in the 4×800 in 8:45.60.

In the 4×400, J-D’s quartet of Taylor, Zach Liebmann, Dylan Volk and Samuel Dye won with 3:39.51 as ESM’s quartet of Jacob Barker, DeShaun Gorman, Cody Todd and Matt Hoalcraft were second in 3:45.74. Liebmann added a second-place time of 53.04 seconds in the 400 sprint.

Nick Harron gained first place in the 3,200-meter run in 10:25.89. Howard needed 24.26 seconds for the runner-up spot in the 200 sprint as teammate Jaquan Tearney was fifth. Dye was second in the 800 in 2:07.33.

Ryan Peters swept the throwing events for J-D, as he heaved the shot put 43’9 ¼” to beat teammate David Barletta (42’ 7 ¾”) as Peters had a top discus throw of 128’8”, with Charlie Scheftic in fifth place. Nate Sturgeon piled up 2,735 points to easily win the five-event pentathlon.

Taylor had a top triple jump of 40’2 ½”, with Dylan Volk (39’10 ¾”) in third place. Liebmann took second in the pole vault, clearing 11’6”, with the Spartans’ Corey Vollmer third as he cleared 11 feet. Taumeras Howard was fifth in the high jump.

McDuffie, who was fourth in the 100 sprint, was victorious in the long jump for the Spartans, going 21’ 5 ¾”, his best leap of the season. Louis Ferrone rose to second in the 3,000-meter steeplechase in 10:46.60, where teammate Cole Oppedisano was fifth.

Jesse Perrone was second in the mile (4:41.72), where Harron was fourth, and third in the 3,200-meter run in 10:31.23, while Hoalcraft got third in the 400 sprint (53.38 seconds) and Nick Schug was fifth in the 800 after a fifth in the mile.